Over the years, computer systems have evolved from stand alone devices into devices that increasingly communicate over a network. This network environment has made its way into home networking and other small network environments. One of the advantages of these networks is the ability to have multiple computing stations while minimizing the capital expended on peripheral devices. These peripheral devices often include printers, scanners, and/or facsimile machines. Some peripheral devices are now available that are multifunction devices. These multifunction devices often combine such things as the printer, scanner, and facsimile machine. The multifunction devices are now moving to a model that allows their use in a network environment. The manufacturers of these devices are recognizing increasing benefits to operation in a network and are therefore moving away from other hard connectors and bus protocols. Additionally, the technology continues to move toward operation in a wireless environment. In this wireless environment, peripherals communicate with a host computer without a hard or cable connection. In this wireless communication model, the bottom level of connectivity will be networked. Therefore, there exists a need to support and manage peripheral devices in a networked environment.
In the current computing world, there are a number of different bus structures. Each different bus structure requires different supporting software, which is often called the support stack. For example, different buses, such as 1394, 802.11, and USB are now used on computers. For each different bus, a support stack having a user interface layer, a driver layer, and a bus adapter layer is necessary. The bus adapter layer is a nontrivial piece of software. It is this portion that must be redone each time changes are made to the bus, and each time a new bus is added. These changes, additions, and alterations can take years to stabilize. It can, therefore, be seen that a need exists to development a system in which the transport level, on which the bus adapter rests, is generalized. If a system is developed in which all peripheral devices communicate over a network, it will be possible to introduce a network stack, even when the peripheral device resides on a local bus. This will allow a single stack, which can support all of the peripheral devices, leading to a lower cost in software maintenance and stability.
Recognizing the need to move toward a network model, manufacturers of certain devices, such as imaging devices, have begun to manufacture devices incorporating an Ethernet network connection. This allows a user to plug the peripheral device into the network. These devices also have associated software that allows a computer on the network to communicate with the specific device to enable it to perform its functions, such as a scan. However, this is a very device-specific solution. This solution requires specific software to be developed for each device. Moreover, the software that is written is effectively a low-level bus enumerator. In the Microsoft Windows Operating System, this software is written in the kernel mode. Typically, developing and altering software in the kernel mode is a difficult task. There is, therefore, a need to generalize the device-specific solutions that exist in the world today. It would be beneficial if all device manufacturers, such as imaging device manufacturers, were able to install a driver that is needed to communicate with their device, and that after such an installation, the device appears and functions as if locally connected to the computer.
In current operating systems, this generalization is not supported, and does not exist. For example, in the Windows Operating System family, an imaging device that is connected through a network does not appear to the operating system as a real device. Thus, if a scanner is connected to the computer through a network, the scanner will not appear in the device manager as a piece of hardware. As such, the network device cannot be managed and controlled, as could a locally connected device. Thus, the driver for the device cannot be properly managed, any updated drivers will not be found and installed, etc. It can therefore be seen that a need exists for a computer system and method that will support network-connected peripheral imaging devices. This need should be addressed on a global basis without the resources required for device-specific solutions.